


A Little Yelp

by Royswordsman (RoySwordsman)



Category: Captain America, Captain America (2011), Iron Man (Comic), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Puppies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-12
Updated: 2012-05-12
Packaged: 2017-11-05 06:12:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/403271
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoySwordsman/pseuds/Royswordsman
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve and Tony have a special date planned, they've finally gotten some time off to spend with one another and they're on their way to a restaurant when something surprises them both and throws their plans off the rails. It's what Steve's always wanted.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Little Yelp

Steve was alone at home, awaiting Tony’s arrival as per usual. He was dressed to perfection, with his dark green military uniform, equipped with golden pins that were so vintage, and yet dazzled when they were struck by the light. The pins were his pride, ones that you could only get if you had served in the war. Though his service was cut short, he was given them as an honorary protector of the great States of America. Most nights he would sit by his bedside and polish them until they sparkled and he would steam his uniform clean. His past was too precious to be touched by others, though it may have been selfish on his part, he was just protective over his past and what he had to remember the times that he missed ever so much. But the best part of wearing that uniform is that he knew Tony loved it.   
Of course Tony loved it, who wouldn’t like it? Steve looked beyond dashing in that uniform, which he chose to modernise by wearing aviators with it. They were Tony’s aviators; one of the many pairs that he had in his extensive collection of sunglasses. Every day the man would wear a new pair, despite the weather. Style was indeed everything and that’s why he loved seeing Steve when he had made an effort.   
But for now Steve sat alone in the large apartment, back straight up against the back of the sofa. It seemed even bigger since he was alone, and used to small spaces. He’d spent so much time in the trenches or in small box-rooms since he was never particularly well off. Living in the great depression meant that he was lucky to have the little space that he did have. He was afraid that if he spoke he could hear his own echo in this place since it was so large, empty and somewhat cold. What may be considered stylish in this day and age in terms of furniture was certainly not from Steve’s perspective. He wanted to live in a cosy, small house with pillows everywhere and a fireplace. Although Tony’s apartment did have a fireplace it was an electric fireplace; you could touch the flames if you turned the heat off, with your bare hands and you wouldn’t even get so much as a singe on your fingertip. That wasn’t his idea of comfy at all. There was always something missing from Tony’s place, despite all of the different kinds of furniture he had around. It wasn’t that he was complaining, heck, he’d never complain to Tony’s face and he was very grateful for the billionaires’ hospitality. Being able to stay in a place like this was a dream for most people. But it just missed that touch of magic that brought everything to life instead of looking so cold. Steve couldn’t exactly place his finger on what he had in mind but Tony’s place just lacked... Life. 

Tony had finished his pre-going out ritual which consisted of him going out beforehand for a couple of drinks. Just a few shots of alcopops to get him buzzing, because he knew for well that Steve wouldn’t approve of him getting completely drunk. There was the odd occasion where he did let it happen but that was more seldom, and was usually when Steve was in a really good mood (or when Tony had managed to slip a heck load of vodka in his drinks, the soldier had one of the world’s fastest metabolisms, if not the fastest, so it took a lot to even get Steve jolly). He made sure to take a couple of breath mints so that the soldier wouldn’t catch on, but he always did and as usual, when he walked through the door with slightly flushed cheeks Steve gave him that disapproving frown. At least he was cutting down, slightly. It would take a much longer time for Steve to completely rehabilitate Tony of that drinking habit, but for now, a little didn’t hurt. Tony would always say to Steve that a glass of red wine every day was good for the heart, to which Steve would reply, “Alcohol destroys the liver.” It was a simple, blunt yet true argument. One that Tony couldn’t be bothered to fight against every day, so he just shrugged it off, despite his argumentative nature and his need to be right all the time. 

“Fashionably late, as always.” Tony said before Steve had the chance to say anything, walking through the door dressed to impress; a dark blue shirt with the two top buttons open, a black band t-shirt under it along with starched suit pants, a black blazer to match with garish, out of place trainers. Though that seemed to be the fashion nowadays. Tony Stark was of course, a fashion icon, a trendsetter and general guy-everyone-wanted-to-be.   
“We’re going to a restaurant and you’re wearing those?” He gestured to the trainers, 

“Hey, gotta wear what the sponsors give me.” He said with a casual shrug and smirk that would make any woman swoon if they caught a glimpse of it. Since Tony was one of the most influential business-people in the world, many companies wanted a piece of that cake so they would often send him freebies or sponsor his company - providing more money (as if he didn’t have enough as it was) and resources to Stark Industries as long as Tony would flaunt their merchandise. He was picky in terms of selecting sponsors so when he did pick one, it would be the best of the best and it would be something he knew he could use and abuse. He had a thing for sneakers so he was more than happy to accept a sponsorship from one of the world's biggest shoe manufacturers, as long as he got the latest trendy high tops (and co-operated with the ethical policy that Stark Industries now implemented which was pretty strict, they had to be environmentally friendly and use of all sweatshops was strictly forbidden, among other things), that’s all that mattered. The perks of being that great were endless. 

“You couldn’t wear a nice pair of shoes?” Steve asked with another frown, getting up and dusting himself out, straightening any crease out of the uniform that was seemingly his pride and joy. As he stood he walked over to Tony, 

“These are a nice pair of shoes.” He replied with a boyish pout, “They just have laces... and are multifunctional.” 

Steve rolled his eyes, “You couldn’t wear a normal black pair?” He added in an attempt to be more specific. 

“Nope.” Tony replied, as the soldier stepped up to him he gave him a grin, leaning up and fixing Steve’s dark green tie that matched his uniform that was so neatly tucked in. He adjusted it so that it was perfectly straight, just like the rest of the soldier - perfect. There wasn’t a thread out of place. “Cute.” Tony said as he tapped the side of Steve’s cheek, leaning up slightly to do so, only to see Steve jut out his lower lip slightly. It was sort of a semi-pout from Tony’s perspective and he let out a breathy laugh, leading the way back out of the door that he was standing in front of, holding the door open for the taller man as they walked out. 

As soon as they walked outside, after they had been escorted to the exit through the elevator, Steve took a deep breath of the brisk night air and smiled, “It’s a nice night for a walk.” He said. It wasn’t the same as when he’d head out at night back in the day, there was far more pollution and smoke around but he wouldn’t let that ruin the atmosphere that he admired. New York City was a city that he loved with all of his heart. He would jump at the chance to walk through the streets while crime was being dealt with by the other Avengers. Steve and Tony had earned their evening off. 

The city was beaming with bright lights and cars zooming by, horning at each other through the chock-a-block roads. There was one thing that Steve would always do. Whenever he was walking down the street and would see someone that was homeless, he’d walk into the nearest food shop and get them some food and a hot drink. Sure it was time consuming and Tony would act as though it was a waste of time but he really admired that about Steve. He cared. He would express genuine concern and even though they were headed out for their own private time and to have fun, the instant he saw the same guy who lived round the corner to central park, Steve would wave to him and get a warm greeting in return.

“One sec.” Steve said to Tony as he jogged into a coffee shop, getting a hot cup of coffee and a bagel, jogging back out with it and handing it to the man who when they had first met, would just stare in awe, but now he was used to Steve’s kindness and would just say 

“Thank you sir.” In return, Steve would smile back and wave, calling the man by name and catching up to Tony again. 

“Sorry.” He said quickly, 

“You and those guys... Seriously Rogers they’re going to drain your cash.” Tony said with a shake of the head,   
“Hey, it’s worth it to see the smile on their faces.” Steve replied. 

“I’d rather donate to charities; at least you know they’re not going to spend the money on drugs.” Tony mumbled, it was true, Stark Industries did have ties with various charities around the world and hence Tony earned the ‘philanthropist’ reputation that superseded his fathers.   
“Everyone needs a little bit of help, now and then.” Steve said as he put his hands into his pockets whilst Tony huddled closer to Steve. He was feeling unusually protective over his boyfriend, probably because they had been apart the whole day and the day before that Tony was away on business. As they say, Separation makes the heart grow fonder.

They continued walking to the restaurant, after a while Steve placed his arm around Tony’s waist and pulled him closer only to receive a content smirk from the millionaire in return as they both walked together, Steve had the aviators on and Tony had matching ones. Nowadays getting matching goods or things in pairs seemed to be quite fun, tacky at first, but Steve had convinced him that it was adorable. So he proudly flaunted his matching accessories. As they walked past one of the many alleyways Steve stopped in his tracks, 

“What is it?” Tony asked as he peered over the frames of his sunglasses. 

“The alley...” He said, removing his shades and placing them in his pocket quickly as he walked toward the alley,   
“Steve it’s probably a racoon or something.” Tony said as he followed Steve closely, trying to peer over his shoulder in curiosity.   
“In the middle of the city?” Steve questioned, 

“Or maybe a giant rat.” Tony said, making himself cringe at the thought. 

Steve saw a card board box and heard more whining, a strange muffling sound as the box moved. His steps were small, cautious, and slow because they didn’t know what they were going to find. As he peered over to the box, Steve’s bright blue eyes widened as large as saucers. 

“W-whats in the box?” Tony said, on his tip toes to try and see over the broad shoulders, holding Steve’s arm to help keep him up as he looked through the gap at the bottom of his sunglasses. 

Steve grinned from ear to ear, kneeling down and scooping the contents up into his arms and turning around and showing Tony – there were 5 puppies. 5 dirty husky puppies that had clearly been out in the cold for far too long, they were shivering and whimpering as they pawed at Steve’s uniform. 

“Tony! Look at them!” He said, looking back at the box and seeing the words saying ‘Puppies – need a home.’ Scribbled in tiny handwriting. He looked at them sadly, “How long do you think they’ve been out here? A couple of days?” 

“They’re so dirty.” Tony said with disgust, backing off slightly, his nose crinkling as he stared at them, covering Steve’s arm in dirt as they squirmed. 

“We’ll clean them.” He said with a smile, heading back in the direction that they had come from. 

“W-wait?! We!? What are you talking about? Steve Rogers you’re not taking them into my house, they’re filthy!” 

“Tony look at them, I’m not going to leave them out here without food, they look starving.” He said with a pout, trying to work his puppy dog eyes on Tony that matched the little dogs in his arms. 

“Urh... We’re not keeping them and you’re going to be the one to wash them and feed them and clean up after them.” Steve grinned even more, walking quickly back to the house with Tony struggling to keep up with the long, quick strides that he was taking. 

As soon as they went into the building Steve went up the stairs being far too impatient to wait for the elevator and walked into Tony’s place, practically running to the bathroom and running the bath, placing the pups into the large, porcelain tub. Tony on the other hand, took the elevator and joined Steve, groaning as he saw dirty paw prints along the walls of the tub as the little runts tried to climb out of it, but just slipped along the smooth surface. Steve removed his blazer and folded it, placing it on a towel rack and rolling up his sleeves as he leaned back down and grabbed the shampoo, using it and cleaning off the puppies that were covered in black and brown dirt. Once they were watered down they showed black and white patterns and had sapphire blue eyes, almost matching the blue of Steve’s. Tony frowned as he saw the dirt that came off them, but seeing Steve’s face, watching him take such care with them and washing them so gently. He genuinely looked happy, with his eyes lit up, even more so as he grabbed a towel and dried each pup, hearing them make soft yelps and whimpers. 

“Tony they’re hungry. Do we have anything for them?” 

“I don’t keep dog chow, Steve.” Tony replied with an eye roll, “I’ll go see and if there’s any leftover food.” He said, walking into the kitchen and seeing scraps of chicken that Steve must’ve left, along with biscuits and crackers that Steve must’ve been eating. He had crackers from the jet still in his pocket too, they were pocket-sized but at least they’d be something. He put everything together in a cooking bowl but jumped as Tony had released the hounds, so to speak. 

The puppies were running around the apartment, climbing up around the furniture and running circles around Tony’s feet. They looked up at him happily, black and white balls of fluff that seemed even puffier after Steve had washed them. They smelled good too, Steve had used his own shampoo on them, which Tony loved, and it smelt of cherries. Each pup as it ran around left that fragrant smell, which wasn’t so bad. 

Steve walked out, drying his hands; he was soaked to the bone. Obviously the little puppies had been splashing around resulting in him being covered in shampoo, dirt and soap. He had to remove his shirt, walking around in that white sleeveless under vest he always had on, with his silver dog tags hanging loose around his neck, making a jingling noise as he walked up to Tony, his smile beaming even brighter as he saw the puppies sitting down and looking up at him patiently before one ran over and started pawing at Tony’s trousers. 

“Eh... Make them move Steve; I can’t put the bowl down.” Tony said as he watched them all, so desperate for food. 

Steve knelt down and picked them up so Tony could put the bowl down, the instant he did, the dogs jumped out of Steve’s arms and started eating the food, “I’ll get them some water too.” Steve said as he walked and grabbed another bowl, filling it with water and placing it next to the food. Even though they were tiny creatures, they finished the food in a matter of minutes and went on to the water, knocking each other about and climbing over each other to get to the food and water, Steve had to make sure that each of them had space and would move them by picking them up so they wouldn’t wrestle with one another. 

After a while, they started running around the living room, jumping along the sofa, biting at the table legs of the coffee table, running around the countless gadgets that Tony had lying around.   
“Hey hey, control them Steve!” He said as he grabbed a puppy that had managed to scramble its way into the trophy cabinet. He held it out in his arms and looked at it straight in the eyes to see large eyes staring back at him with sheer curiosity and a pink tongue poking out of its mouth, almost as though it was smiling at him. Tony tilted his head and as he did so the puppy mimicked him. He felt his heart melt, okay; maybe they were already starting to grow on him. But the main thing was that they made Steve happy as he watched the soldier run around the house trying to keep them together and pulling them out of trouble. At least Steve was getting a good workout, but it was amusing too for Tony to watch, seeing the little creatures run around with their tongues out, pawing at everything in sight and they really took a shine to Steve.

The moment that Steve sat down on the sofa to catch his breath, 4 of them jumped on his lap and scampered around, whimpering for attention as he cuddled each and every one of them. Love was oozing from him. He’d always wanted a puppy when he was small but growing up during the Great Depression had meant that he couldn’t really afford them. But now he had these’s adorable bunch of husky puppies that seemed too good to be true. They licked his face and hands and he laughed so happily, but there was one puppy that just wouldn’t leave Tony alone.

Tony would walk into the kitchen, it’d follow him. He’d walk into the bedroom to change clothes and it would follow him and just sit by the door until it was done. Its ears seemed to curl at the tips, so it had floppy ears rather than the rest of them that had sharp ears. At first Tony would give the puppy a strange look and roll his eyes, but the more it followed him around, the more he began to like it – it was his own ‘puppy butler’ one could say. It even jumped to sit next to him as he sat on one of the stools in the kitchen. Tony was trying to eat a grilled cheese sandwich but seeing that cute little ball of fur staring at him with a look of glee in its eyes made him pout and pulled at his heart strings more than he ever thought it would. He ended up sharing his sandwich with it, seeing it chomp happily at the crusts then jump into Tony’s lap and lick him. 

“Ew!” Tony said as it licked, but the smell of cherries along with its adorable face reminded him so much of Steve. “Fine. Okay. I like you.” He said to it. “I’ll name you Steve... No wait, that’d be confusing... Stebe. That it. With a B.” He said patting it on the head. The puppy barked and nuzzled up to Tony’s chest and as much as he attempted to hide a smile, he laughed. 

After he had eaten, he walked into the living room to see Steve sprawled out on the sofa with the puppies clambering over his body, though Tony just moved Steve’s head and lifted it up, placing it into his own lap as he sat down. He was exhausted already, and it had only been a matter of hours. It was clear that the puppies were exhausted too; they began to curl up over Steve’s body. 

Stebe waddled into the room and wrapped his body around Tony’s feet, enjoying the warmth. Tony let out a laugh, “Stebe.” He said smugly. So he loved the puppies already, he was always afraid of getting too attached to things like these; each had their own distinct personality. But then again, he was afraid of falling in love. Period. But Steve had helped him get over that fear, and now it seemed that the super soldier was encouraging Tony to open his heart to other things. In particular, these little puppies. 

“Hm?” Steve said as he tilted his head further back and looked up at Tony, 

“I wasn’t talking to you. I’ve named him Stebe.” He said, pointing to the puppy that was curled up by his feet, breathing softly.   
“What? Why that?” Steve asked, 

“Because he reminds me of you.” Tony said, “And having one Steve is enough, so I had to be innovative.” Tony said with a smirk. 

“Me? How?”

“Steve you’re a giant puppy.” Tony replied with a head shake, patting Steve on the head only to see him pout, “See, you’re adorable.” He added, pinching Steve’s cheeks, “For a soldier.” 

“Well, I’ll take that as a compliment.” Steve murmured, 

“So you should.” 

“So... You’ve named him; does it mean we’re keeping them?” 

Tony rolled his eyes, “Well this one’s special... He has a name already.” He didn’t want to say yes straight away nor did he really have the heart to say no. For a business tycoon, he was really becoming a softie and that was all Steve’s doing. It was only at home of course, at the work place he was ruthless but the soldier really did bring out qualities in himself that he never realised he possessed. 

“But I’ve named them all already.” Steve said quickly before Tony could really finish, he pointed to each puppy in turn and named them all, he hadn’t really named them in advance he just had to think of something on the spot to give Tony a reason to allow him to keep them, “This one’s Blueberry, then we have Microwave, Microchip and Bacon.” He said. 

“...Really?” Tony said with an eyebrow wave “Bacon?” Tony snorted. 

“Hey, they’ve got names haven’t they?” Steve said in return. “Names are names.” 

“Fair enough... Fine, we’ll see how it goes.”

Steve smiled and leaned up, kissing Tony softly with gratitude, as their lips met Tony felt his heart flutter. He didn’t realise how deeply in love with the solider he had actually fallen, now he was in a spiral of no return and he regretted nothing. Steve clearly loved him in return, wrapping the arm that was closest to Tony around his waist as they kissed. It was a long, gentle, affectionate kiss. The puppies looked up and one of them even covered its eyes with its paws, 

“Microwave, jeez.” Steve said with a laugh as their lips parted. “We should really go to sleep Tony...” Steve said as he looked over at the clock.   
Tony nodded, “Who’s stopping you?” He asked, carding his fingertips through Steve’s hair with gentle strokes. Steve smiled warmly and gently, curling up to Tony and shutting his eyes as Tony rest his head back on the sofa and did the same. They were both more exhausted than they would thought they would be, though looking after the puppies really did use up a heck load of energy. 

Steve drifted into his thoughts, waking up early in the morning to see the puppies playing with each other and pulling at Tony’s socks. Tony was a pretty heavy sleeper, he didn’t really wake up at all, even though they tugged and tugged until the sock came off Tony’s foot and they all started playing tug of war with it. This was exactly what Tony’s place needed, he had thought before that it was empty, that it was dull and cold but now with these puppies running around, it made it seem as though they had a family. Though they would have to take turns to look after them, when they were together it already seemed like a family which in truth was what both of them really wanted. To be happy together, to give each other what they never truly had the chance to enjoy; a family. 

There wasn’t a problem with the apartment at all; it just needed a bit of life.


End file.
